Lent. We are in the season of Lent, a time of reflection and preparation in the church year. But you know that.

Lent was a paradoxical time for me as a pastor, and it may be that for you. It was a time intended for reflection, but I was busier than usual with additional worship services and other pastoral work. It was hard to find the time for self-reflection or any other kind of reflection. (In my first two years as a pastor, I thought Lent would be a wonderful time to add extra Bible studies and …

Did you know that 4 out of 5 states require clergy to alert authorities when they suspect a child has been abused or neglected? USA Today published a chart in their Dec. 16, 2011 issue showing which types of adults are specifically required to report abuse in each state, and whether failing to report it is a crime. Find out what the state law says for your internship site.

Having completed the mid-point evaluation (it is completed and submitted, isn’t it?), March is a good time for the lay committee to check back on some of the basics, the things we look at when the internship year begins, but might forget about later. Such as:

Learning Goals. While these are essentially worked out between the intern and the supervisor, it’s good for the lay committee to know what the goals are. You might have seen it at the beginning of the year. Whether you did …

Daylight Savings Time begins on Sunday, March 11. If you are one of our perfectionist interns, you will set your alarm clock for 2 a.m. when you go to bed on Saturday night, then wake up and push the proper buttons to set the clock ahead one hour. If you are a normal productive intern, you will set the clock ahead before you go to bed on Saturday night.

If you are one of those I-do-my-best-work-at-the-last-minute (meaning I-only-work-at-the-last-minute) types, you might still be …

They were a little short on parent volunteers to help with the kindergarten Valentine’s Day party, so the lovely Mrs. McKinley and I volunteered to join the merriment in our grandson Luke’s room with the stipulation that I not be asked to help with a craft. I don’t do crafts, even at the kindergarten level.

So there I was, assisting at a Cupid Bingo game, helping the young scholars differentiate between the picture of the heart that said “Hug Me” and the picture of the …